Aliza's 7th Birthday

Aliza's birthday fell on a Friday this year. Abbie and Avery surprised her before school with a beta fish. Aliza's top wish this year was her very own fish. She named it Hello Kitty Ariel Phillips. We put a cute figurine of Hello Kitty in the fish bowl, so she thought it would be cute to name her fish that. Now when you look in the bowl it say's Hello Kitty kind of like a name plate. Sounds good to me.

Her food choices this year included pancakes and sausage for breakfast, a lunch date with mom and Subway sandwiches for lunch, and crepes for dinner. She waited all day to open her gifts. Luckily, she had gymnastics after school which helped the long wait for dad to get home and open her gifts.

She requested a rainbow cake with blue frosting. This cake was fun to make, and yummy too.

I think she was definitely spoiled this year. Grandparents sent such fun things, and the cards sent from family were amazing. This little girl ended up with $65 in cash, plus some gift cards. Holy Cow!

Micah picked out for her a necklace and earrings with pink, sparkly unicorns on them. Her reaction was priceless. She was ecstatic to say the least. She has been wearing them constantly since she got them.

Our beautiful rainbow cake with cookies and cream ice cream.

We are continuing our tradition of everyone in our family writing a letter to the birthday girl. I snuck a peak at her letters from her sisters and it made me cry because they were so sweet. I'm sure Aliza felt very loved.

The day after her birthday we took two of Aliza's best friends to the mall to make a Build a Bear together. Look at how sweet these girls are. They were all so excited.

I was so glad that Abbie and Avery came to help me out, because it was hard to keep track of these three girls. They helped these girls pick out their bears and outfits.

Aliza chose a cute Polar Bear she named Leila.

Getting hearts ready to stick in their bears.

 Giving the heart a big kiss before placing it inside their bear.

Giving their bears a little bath and brushing.

Three very happy girls off to McDonald's for lunch. We all had a wonderful time at Aliza's party. Like I said before, she was very spoiled this year. We all love our Lizzie, and I can't imagine our family without her. She keeps us smiling and laughing all of the time. I love her to peices!

St. Patricks Day

I love St Patrick's day simply for the fact that we can do something fun and different from our usual weekly routine. Our kids woke up to their favorite cereal that I rarely buy. They have gotten better at eating all of the cereal without just picking out the marshmallows. I can't blame them because I would like to just pick out and eat the marshmallows too.

That leprechaun left me a mess to clean up. The kids thought this was hilarious.

I had to snap a picture of this cute girl in her green. We had quite a few cards and packages full of green surprises. They loved it all.

We had our traditional green dinner. This year was green pesto pasta, green beans, green salad and rainbow jello cups. We had planned on green sherbet floats, but I ended up taking Avery to the doctor for strep throat. So, we enjoyed our floats the next day. So glad we could get Avery started on some medicine.

Aliza even had a leprechaun mess up her first grade classroom and leave them a treat. I don't know what room mom would do something like that. ;)

Festival / Mall Art

Avery did a fantastic job last week performing in Festival. We used to call it Federation when I was growing up, but here in Nevada it's Festival. She was relieved to find out that she played very last this year, because last year she had to go first. In my opinion they saved the best for last.

She received a Superior rating again this year, and it was very much deserved. She learned one of her pieces in three weeks. We were really feeling the time crunch, but her teacher really wanted to push her. Avery really did a fabulous job, and I was so thrilled to be able to go watch her perform. They performed on a stage at UNLV which was a fun change. Usually it's just in a classroom setting.

To our surprise last weekend Avery received a text from a friend letting her know that her art was hanging in the mall. So we took a trip to the mall to check it out. There were about 20 pieces of artwork hanging on the wall from her school. Avery's is the one on the top with a wave. We were so surprised and grateful that someone spotted her artwork and told us about it.

An up close look of her awesome skeleton catching a wave. I couldn't figure out an angle that wouldn't glare. I love how this just screams Avery's personality.

Then to our surprise Aliza found a piece of her artwork too. For there only being a few selected from the school, I'm still perplexed at to why the art teacher didn't let either of my kiddo's know. What a cool thing to have your artwork hanging in the mall. Both girls were asking if they could keep the frame, and I just laughed because who know's if we will even get the artwork back. I don't know what's going on apparently. We wouldn't have even known if it wasn't for Avery's friend. How fun!

First Grade Field Trip

I had a fun opportunity to attend Aliza's first grade field trip to the Dolphin Habitat and Secret Garden at the Mirage hotel. It was a perfect field trip because it was timed perfectly so that this group of kids were the only ones at the facility. They had just let the dolphins out for the day, so they were very active and fun to watch.

Aliza was chosen to wear a dolphin suit as they described the different parts of a dolphin. She made a very cute dolphin. The instructor made the comment that she was so small, that she was swimming in this dolphin costume.  Get it? Swimming…….haha

The secret garden had a leopard, lions, and white tigers. They had the opportunity to feel hair from a lions main, and it's whiskers. This picture below shows Aliza's size compared to her classmates. She is adorable!

February 2014

Abbie is starting to like Young Women's more and more. This is her wonderful group of Beehives. Oh, how I miss working with them. Just when I had adjusted, and was enjoying working in activity day's twice a month they asked me to be with the YCL's at girls camp this upcoming Summer. With there being 75 YCL's attending camp this year it's quite the task. The last few Sunday's have been very hectic working with the YCL's to get them ready for all their responsibilities before and at camp. It's fun though too. We have our first camp kick off this upcoming Tuesday that we all have to attend to sing a fun YCL song. I'm not sure how I'm going to remember all their names, but I'm trying. Plus, I get to spend another year at girls camp with Abbie. :)

Micah had the girls at work with him a few weeks back. They have a board room at his work with a giant white board wall. Hours of fun for these ladies. We'll Aliza doesn't look happy in the picture, but I was told that they had a good time.

Avery did her living museum project on Annie Oakley. She looked adorable, and did a great job memorizing her part. All the parents and students at the school would walk around and push a button at each station if they wanted to learn about someone in history. I personally learned from this project that most famous people in history were crazy. Not Annie Oakley, but most of the other people represented. Avery presented her speech many, many times and started it each time with "Hi Y'all, I'm Annie Oakley" with a slight southern accent.  I loved it!

Valentines day came and went. This was the first year in a long time that we didn't have to make Valentine boxes at home. I really missed working on the boxes together. Aliza made this box at school, and she was thrilled with all her Valentines and treats. Micah and I gave the girls swim suits with a tag that said "We abso-suit-ly love you." I thought it was cute.

Avery was able to attend a Stake Activity Day activity about the Olympics. She met an actual Para- Olympic Champion in swimming, Courtney Jordan. They were able to hold the gold medal's and listen to her speak about her struggles and trials. Courtney gave powerful testimony of having to work hard through your struggles, and to never giving up. It was very inspiring.

Abbie had her very first tennis tournament in February. If you ask me, I thought it was a great experience, but she didn't enjoy herself too much. Her coach warned that the first few tournaments would be rough, but Abbie was still discouraged. It turned out to be a really hot day, plus her asthma was acting up a bit. Maybe from nerves? The following weekend her coach had a small tournament just for his students that went much better. I'm glad she got back on the court and tried again. She is a great tennis player. She needs to just keep trying!

Abbie's 13th Birthday

We officially have a teenager in the house! Abbie celebrated her birthday on Saturday, February 8th because her actual birthday was on Sunday the 9th. She invited four friends to have dinner at "Steak and Shake" followed by a round of bowling. Her request was to have a booth all to themselves, so Micah and I ate at a table just a few feet away to keep an eye on them.

I was so proud of these girls ordering and taking care of everything all by themselves. Abbie has a great ability to chose good friends, and they had so much fun together. 

 A few silly selfless off Abbie's phone during dinner.

We bought everyone matching, silly socks for bowling. We wrapped them all up with candy and treats to munch on. They seemed to be a hit.

I thoroughly enjoyed watching these young ladies interact with each other, and play a game together. They are so cute! I also really enjoyed that her party was so easy for me to organize and follow through with. All I had to do is kick back and watch these girls have fun. That's my kind of party.

The next day was Abbie's actual birthday. With it being Sunday, we tried to make it as fun as we could. She woke up to streamers in her favorite color, and with church at 1:00pm we were able to enjoy a relaxing morning together. 

In fact she was ready for church early, and had time to just relax and play on her phone. I snuck this picture right before we left for church. Abbie is in the process of redoing her room, so most of her gifts were related to that this year.

She requested an ice cream cake which was delicious. Basically, we stacked ice cream sandwiches together, put cool whip, oreo's and fudge on top. It's one of our family favorites.

We have the tradition of the birthday girl picking all her favorite foods to eat on her special day. Here is the list of Abbie's favorite food picks.

I'm having them also fill out a survey each birthday so we can remember what they were doing or liked at each age.

I started the tradition this year to also have every member of the family write the birthday girl a special note to read before bed on their birthday. Below is Abbie's notes ready to be read waiting on her pillow. A fun surprise to end her special day.

Abbie is growing up to be such a wonderful young lady. I am always impressed by her ability to make everyone smile who is around her, and she is always such a good example to everyone. She is a wonderful teenager and I'm so thankful to be her mother.